Editing Content with the Rich Text Editor

Creating richly formatted browser-based text is easy with the CommonSpot Rich Text Editor (RTE) . The RTE includes a suite of powerful and familiar tools that make creating rich text as easy as using any standard word processor.

The Rich Text Editor is a common component of several tools/elements within CommonSpot. They include:

Well organized interface: Four (4) logically-organized toolbars make it easier to find features, and usability has been improved through new icons, labels, and tooltips on buttons and drop-down menus.

Property inspectors: Advanced options are available when adding many types of content (tables, images, links, buttons, etc.) through the Rich Text Editor. For example when adding a table, advanced options include settings for table alignment and for the width and color of the table borders. The new version of the Rich Text Editor groups all of these options together in a Property Inspector panel that is always visible at the bottom of the page. The options on the Property Inspector change depending on what you are managing at the time. For example your Property Inspector panel will display one set of options while you are managing text, but when you change to managing a table, the Property Inspector will change to show options relevant to tables.

CSS-based rendering: CommonSpot’s rich text editor provides robust support for rendering via CSS styles. The editor can be configured by the site administrator to either show a listing of styles based on the current page’s style sheets, or to display a listing of style based on registered styles. The styles are available for selection through the Style drop-down selection list in the rich text editor’s toolbar. The Styles in the selection list are rendered as they will look on the page so that you can easily pick the one you want.

In addition, Contributors can format a block of text as a single unit, using familiar formatting headings such as H1, H2, <p>, and <div>. Simply select the paragraph or place the cursor inside it, then choose a heading tag from the Format drop-down in the toolbar. The heading is set for the entire paragraph that contains the current selection. If that paragraph already has a heading tag applied, that tag is replaced by the new one. The image below shows the block-level formats in the Format drop-down menu.

Content Snippets: When the same content is used in multiple places, you don’t need to maintain each instance separately. Instead, you can use snippets to save time and minimize editing. A snippet is an .htm file that you can insert in page at any time. This file contains a certain structure and design that you often need when editing online content.

HTML Code Cleaning: There are many times when the content that you are about to publish has been saved previously in Microsoft Word. When copying text from MS Word and pasting it into the Rich Text Editor, you’re also pasting in tags created specifically for Word that can create problems when the text is displayed as HTML. To ensure that content displays correctly in a browser, these extra tags should be removed. You can significantly reduce the time you spend reformatting your documents in HTML if you use the HTML cleaning functions. The Rich Text Editor even has a paste function specifically for Word content, which helps you get the best results so that you get the most out of both editing tools.